Criminal law - 2.2 General elements of criminal liability Flashcards
What is the element of AR?
- the act of committing the crime (intentional/unintentional)
- must be voluntary, includes specific act, states of affairs crime or a crime of omission.
What is the element of MR?
- Guilty mind.
- the fault element links to intention.
what is the voluntary principle for AR?
- 1) D must committed the crime voluntary.
-2) D must commit the crime by positive action.
- if the AR was involuntary, the AR has not been committed and D is not guilty.
Case: Voluntary principe for Hill v Baxter (1958).
Facts : D drove across a road junction, ignoring illuminated halt sign, hit a car. D was confused, no medical explanation.
Legal principle: D found guilty, But judges ruled that he was not acting voluntary. e.g attacked by swarm of bee.
Case: Voluntary principe for R v Larsonneur.
Facts : Larsonneur was deported from uk to ireland. deported from ireland to uk,
LP : state of affair crime.
what is the AR for conduct crime?
- is the conduct for criminal offence. e.g theft: action of committing theft makes you guilty.
what is the AR for consequence
crime?
- in which your conduct must result in a consequence for this offence.
- AR is committed if a particular consequence is the outcome of your conduct. e.g charged with murder of somebody must be dead. Without the consequence of a dead body this won’t be charged.
what is the AR for state of affairs crime?
- D can commit an offence by ‘being’ then ‘doing’
- e.g having an offensive weapon in public place. s1 of prevention of crime act 1953. in possession of weapon is offensive.
what is omission?
- is the failure to act.
- General rule is that omission is not AR. is known as lack of ‘good samaritan law’.
what is the exception of omission?
- statutory duty: e.g s1 of the children and persons act 1933 — we are required by law to carry out.
- contractual duty: legal obligation where parties required to fulfil in the contract. E.g Faulkner v. Vollin Holdings Ltd.
- duty of relationship: Each married partner has a legal duty to support the other R v Gibbions proctor.
- duty which has been taken on voluntarily
- Duty to through one’s official position.
- Duty which’s arises because the defendant has set in motion because of a chain of events.
What is the problems with Good Samaritan’ law?
- An untrained person,
by intervening could
do more harm then good. - Should the would-be
rescuers have to put
themselves at risk in
order to help? - Who decides that there is an
emergency so that the Good
Samaritan law is operating.
What is causation?
- where the consequences must be proved. Prosecution must show legal and factual cause of the consequence.
Factual cause: ‘but for’ rule for d action, and victim would have not suffered.
Legal cause: is the percentage contribution by d to the consequence.
What is breaking the chain of causation?
- have to consider Victims own actions, if their action was reaction/conduct was ‘reasonably foreseeable’ d is responsible for the outcome. if their action was not foreseeable e.g overreaction , d is not guilty.
- Novus actus interveniens = ‘new intervening acts’ intervening acts may break the chain of causation. D cannot be gulity.
What is the two types of causation?
- Result Crime: AR of result crime specifies the causing of a particular criminal result as the guilty act.
- conduct crime: The actus reus of a conduct crime specifies the undertaking of a particular behaviour or action as the guilty act.
What is intention in MR?
- Intention is a decision by D to bring about the criminalised act.
- it is the highest level of fault then recklessness.
What is direct intention?
- D directly intends a criminal consequence. And AR of criminal offence.
- it was their aim, purpose.
What is oblique intention?
- the defendant does not necessarily want an outcome to occur, but the chances of that outcome are so high, and the defendant realised this and continues their action.
What is recklessness?
- where the D does not want the AR to occur, but the risk may occur because of their actions and D realises this and continues anyways.
- Recklessness is a less serious form of MR.
What is subjective recklessness?
- Where the defendant knows there is a risk of the consequence happening but takes the risk anyway.
What is objective recklessness?
- Where an ordinary person would have realised the risk but the D didn’t.
What is the levels of intention?
- Intention = Specific intent: full intention to cause desired outcome.
- Subjective
recklessness = Basic intent : recklessness and awareness of risk of causing outcome. - Negligence = Negligence : failure to meet the standard of the reasonable man.
Specific intent crimes: where intent will satisfy MR.
Basic intent crimes: where recklessness will satisfy MR.
What is negligence?
- failure to meet the standards to the reasonable person.
What is strict liability?
- Offences that requires no MR. And is to regulate society and protect vulnerable.
What is transferred malice?
- MR can be transferred from the intended victim to the actual victim, but the AR remains the same.
- eg aiming a punch at a victim missing but hitting another unintended victim.
